Teach Privately 

Teaching music privately is something that can be rewarding, as well as a good way to make a living.  For some time, music lessons have been taught through schools and academy's as well as privately from independent teachers who run a small business from their home teaching music.  Most accomplished music teachers will either teach at a university or college, while others will teach privately. 

There is a lot to be done when one takes on the task of teaching privately.  There is running that business, taxes, acquiring the business/students to achieve this goal and so on.  Since that time, there has been a lot of sites that offer a directory or a way to connect teachers with students.  While it is probably best not to link these sites and point out there flaws, they are apparent.  With sites that collect $100 per year or more for people to have a small add space on their site to drive students to them. 

This approach works and it is great for the teacher to have a small fee in advertising and then to have a lot of students sent to them.  The issue lies in companies that are studios of music, that offer "mobile" or "in-home" lessons.  These companies hire private or independent students, and then they overcharge the student and bombard them with regulations and rules as to when to make up lessons etc. and then to make things even worse, they pay the private teacher through their business about half of what the teacher could make privately.

This isn't so bad if one does not have the will to run their own business, but for many teachers having to get students this way is quite a burden.  Not to mention the W9 form you are responsible for at the end of the year to pay taxes!  It's like they are paying you basic wages for something that requires years of study, possibly a degree and at least dedication.  So if you are a music teacher and want to teach privately, by all means you should find a way.  There are an abundance of other benefits to teach privately as well.  You can make up your own lessons, you can handle your own taxes at the end of the year and even write of all of your business expenses like printer ink, guitar strings, or even that guitar you have been dying to purchase!

It's clear that with the popularity of american idol and rock band that there has never been more of a desire to learn music.  United States is the music and art hub of the entire world and there is an ever increasing demand to learn to play music, and not pretend to play music via a videogame!

Community

One of the most underrated resources for someone learning music, is a community of support.  I suggest a site like HubLessons that offers a Private Music Lessons Directory as well as a free community just like myspace or facebook to talk about music and what you are learning.  This is similar to hubpages in the sense that people can create profiles and teachers can write their own lessons on the site, print them out or save them to PDF or even email them to a friend.

A teacher can print out a lesson they liked and bring it to their next private lesson!  All of those teachers students can join for free as well and have a community of backing support as they learn music and even make some freinds along the way -- form bands; a community is limitless.

Craigslist is also a great way to have a community when learning music.  There are tons of people on craigslist to either work with in a band setting or even private teachers who advertise there.  It is a great resource for anyone who wants to work privately and have some kind of a community to speak, mingle and learn.

Foundation

It is important that as a new teacher or student, that you build a proper foundation.  Basically, if you are a teacher teaching students music and theory you should make every effort possible to enable them the gift of music.  Teach them theory, teach them improvisation but you must keep them interested!  If you are a music student then building a foundation of music consists of many months of practice and dedication.  It is important to practice what you don't like as well as what you do like and remember that battles are an everyday part of being a musician!